【平阳县】Another Giant Leap for Mankind

陈舒铭 2021-08-16 16:44:30

On 4 July 2021, the Shenzhou-12 astronauts Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo left Tiangong, the core module of the space station, for a seven-hour spacewalk when they completed all the tasks like tested out new-generation spacesuits, installed equipment, elevated a panoramic camera, and tested Tiangong’ s robotic arm. It seems to be one small step for ‘taikonauts’, but another giant leap for mankind.

There are now two working space stations in the world, one is the International Space Station (ISS) and the other is the Chinese Space Station. The ISS was started in 1998, led by the United States, with the joint participation of 16 countries, and the total investment is over $100 billion. However, the ISS is expected to be decommissioned in 2024 due to severe ageing of its equipment. At that time, the Chinese space station will be the only space station in space.

“ The Earth is the cradle of humanity, but humanity cannot live in a cradle forever”, and now mankind has a new ‘house’ in space. The house has three ‘bedrooms’, two ‘living-rooms’, and a storage room, and the total space for activities is 110 cubic metres. On the Chinese space station, the interfaces that need to be operated by the astronauts are all in Chinese, using the Kylin operating system, which was developed independently by China. And it is worth mentioning that the cabin has full Wi-Fi coverage this time.

According to China's future series of launches, more experimental and manned capsules will be attached to the core module from April 2021 to November 2022, together forming the complete Chinese space station. The construction of the new space station will be of great help to the world’ s progress towards cosmic exploration and will further promote global cooperation in spaceflight for the scientific and technological progress of all mankind. What’ s more, it offers the world a different possibility that without a superpower country, China can make major aerospace breakthroughs on its own. This is not only an achievement for the Chinese, but also good news for scientists worldwide.

Scientific and technological developments, especially space exploration, should not and can not be held back by political struggles. Although missed out on the construction of the International Space Station due to premature timing, China never gives up lightly on building its aerospace business. All difficulties forced China to seek survival on a desperate basis, thus fully developing its aerospace technology, and finally possesses technology and equipment with fully independent intellectual property rights now. To date, China’ s aerospace industry has taken a path of development in line with its own characteristics, from the ‘two bombs and one star’, which were the result of hard work and self-reliance, to the world-renowned manned airship programme, and has made a series of significant achievements.

China plans to carry out more extensive and in-depth international cooperation in the areas of space station function expansion, space science and applications, joint flights by Chinese and foreign astronauts, and transformation of technological achievements, so as to make the Chinese space station a space laboratory for the benefit of all mankind. On all accounts, nothing can change the fact that outer space is the common wealth of people all over the world, and the exploration of the universe is a common cause for all mankind.